Keeping Watch
by sendmethemoon
Summary: "The way her eyebrows are knit together, the slight tremble of her body he can feel against his own. Her expression is unreadable, in the dark it's hard to tell, but he thinks maybe it's fear."
1. Chapter 1

**DISCLAIMER:** Unless I missed the memo, I do not own any of the Castle characters or pre-existing story lines.

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Keeping Watch

Some nights he watches her sleep. Okay, _most _nights he watches her sleep. Sometimes he even falls asleep watching her. To think less than a year ago they were sleeping separately baffles him – he can't imagine it being any other way now.

She really is cute when she sleeps though. The way her hand fists the comforter that's pulled up to her chin, the tiny little snorts she lets out when she changes positions – though she'd vehemently deny that. She's so vulnerable and small, but still so elegant, even with the mess of soft chestnut curls plastered to the side of her face. He's memorized everything. Every little detail, he's got it all catalogued away in a rather large portion of his heart reserved only for her.

Tonight he isn't sure what wakes him, but he's still lying facing her, propped up on his elbow. He's just about to relax against his pillow and let the sleep take over, when he notices something. Something new. The way her eyebrows are knit together, the slight tremble of her body he can feel against his own. Her expression unreadable, in the dark it's hard to tell, but he thinks maybe it's fear. When she starts to stir, he reaches to turn on his bedside lamp, never once taking his eyes off her. With the soft glow he can see the tears clearly. She's crying. There's no sound between them, safe for the rustling of the sheets every time her body jerks in an attempt to flee – from what, he isn't sure.

Then he hears it.

"No."

It's almost inaudible, her voice soft and desperate. He shifts his weight and sits up, reaches out to touch her, soothe her, anything. He read somewhere once that you're not supposed to wake people having nightmares. Or maybe it was people who are sleepwalking. Whatever the case may be, the distressed sob that escapes Kate's lips is all it takes.

"Kate." He says, gently shaking her shoulder, "Hey, wake up. Kate."

She's struggling now, her body reacting to his touch, perceiving it as a threat, the nightmare in her head morphing with her reality. Her body thrashes almost violently and if her breathing gets any quicker, he's pretty sure she's going to hyperventilate. He scrambles up and kneels next to her, braces his hands on her forearms in an attempt to still her movements. "Kate, come on wake up." He says it louder this time, trying to force her out of her sleep. Her eyes fly open, but they don't focus, as she continues the struggle against the arms that are all but pinning her down. "Hey, hey. It's okay, it's me. Kate. It's me."

She follows the voice and finds his face in the dim lighting, her eyes wide, horrified, as she tries to figure out where she is. "You're okay." He loosens the grip on her arms and reaches a tentative hand up to her cheek, brushing away the tears that continue to fall. "You're okay." And this time she must believe him because her face relaxes and she reaches up to him pull him down but he's already curling her into his side as he settles next to her.

He wants so desperately to ask what had her so afraid, but he knows now isn't the moment. So he kisses the top of her head, and whispers words of reassurance until he hears her breathing even out and the warm, damp patch of tears on his t-shirt begins to cool.

He doesn't go back to sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**DISCLAIMER:** Unless I missed the memo, I do not own any of the Castle characters or pre-existing story lines.

**A/N: **So this was originally supposed to be a one-shot whose ending caused a little bit of an uproar amongst its readers. Due to the overwhelming response (for which I'm super grateful) I have decided to continue the story with two more chapters (yaaay!). The third and final chapter has been written and is currently being edited but I expect it will be up within the next couple of days barring any unforeseen circumstances. I also feel I owe an explanation for the way the original story was left. I had written the story as a post-ep for Recoil and had intended the nightmare to be about well everything that would have been brought to the surface in the ep. However, I've always stuck by the notion that our dear Kate Beckett has been a sufferer of nightmares for the majority of her adult life, but not to worry, I'll elaborate in chapter three. Until then, enjoy!

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Keeping Watch: Part Two

She doesn't remember.

He can tell by the way she flounces around his kitchen, pouring their coffee like nothing had happened.

"Morning." Kate beams at him as he takes several tentative steps towards her. "So listen, barring any body drops, today's probably gonna be a pretty slow day so I was thinking we could try that Thai place on 56th that Lanie told us about…"

He gapes at her as she speaks, watching as she continues to go about her morning. Just hours before he was cradling her trembling, fear-stricken body in his arms and now she wants to go for Thai food.

"Castle." He jerks out of his silent shock, realized he hasn't actually entered the kitchen yet. "You okay?"

"Am I -" he stops himself and shakes his head in disbelief, "Are _you _okay?"

Kate narrows her eyes at him in amusement and shrugs, "Yeah…why?"

"You don't remember?" She shrugs and he elaborates, "Last night, you don't remember last night?"

"Castle what are you talking about? Remember what?" It's her turn to gape at him, wonders what could possibly have him so worked up.

"You don't remember the nightmare? You don't remember me waking you up?"

She opens her mouth to speak but then closes it, considering what he's just said. She tilts her head pensively "Uh…vaguely." She shrugs her shoulders and glances over at him. "I don't know, why?"

"Why? Because whatever you dreamed about drove you to the brink of total panic."

She chews the inside of her cheek, examining his features. The worry lines in his face are deeper and she notices the dark circles under his eyes. "Look, Castle, I'm sorry if I scared you, but I mean, it was just a nightmare. It's really not that big a deal."

He scoffs at her, regrets it immediately because _oh shit, _she looks offended now, but he's really at a loss. Can't understand how she's so cavalier about this. "No big deal? Really? Because from where I was, it looked like a pretty big deal to me."

"Well, it's not as if I can control it."

"No, I know that, I just -" he pauses "I want to know what scared you. I don't want you to evade this and feel like you need to go deal with it on your own."

"Evade it. Really?" It sounds worse when she says it, not at all what he wanted to say. He should know by now that's not her style anymore. A year ago, absolutely, but not now. Not after everything. "That's what you think I'm doing? Avoiding the subject so that I don't have to deal with it? Castle, I don't even remember what the damn dream was about!

_Shit. _Now she's angry.

"Kate, that's not -"

"No you know what?" She holds up a hand to silence him and shakes her head. "Just, forget it. I have to go work. Apparently I have some _evading _to do." She rolls her eyes and grabs her keys, gun and badge off the counter. "I'll see you later."

With that she's out the door, and the coffee she poured for him has gone cold.


	3. Chapter 3

**DISCLAIMER:** Unless I missed the memo, I do not own any of the Castle characters or pre-existing story lines.

**A/N: **Alright so here it is, finally! I won't get into all the hairy details as to why this was so late, but if you're nosy and would like them, I posted on my Tumblr:** sendmethe-moon dot tumblr dot com** a couple days ago with a full explanation and sincerest of apologies. But once again I am so, so sorry. This chapter was longer than I'd hoped so I broke it down into two, just in case there are posting issues and some of you want my head on a platter when you see how I've ended this chapter. That being said, thank you to everyone who read/reviewed/favorited/followed this story and to the people who demanded more after the first chapter, congratulations. Hope this lives up to your expectations! Enjoy!

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Keeping Watch: Part Three

Kate Beckett is no stranger to nightmares.

They're something she's been dealing with for what feels like forever. Some were more intense than others. Some more violent – she's woken up with scrapes on her arms, scratches surrounding the puckered skin in between her breasts.

She wracks her brain, trying to think of what she could have been dreaming of. It could've been a number of things really. The explosion in her old apartment. The explosion at the bank. The old lady in the cage. Particularly gruesome investigations. Her mother's body in the alley. The cemetery where she nearly met her own demise.

Kate shakes her head to rid herself of all the thoughts that are now putting a damper on her already less than desirable mood. She looks back to her desk and can't find a single paper clip.

She searches her desktop organizer, checks her drawers and on the top left finds a chain of nearly 50.

_Castle._

She rolls her eyes. That stupid man. That stupid, silly man. That stupid, silly man that got little, if any, sleep last night because he was up worrying about her. The man who's worry about near broke her heart this morning. The man who cared enough to wake her up.

He woke her up.

She doesn't know when she became such a sap, but she rises from her desk, neatly piling all of her paperwork she doesn't remember finishing at the corner of her desk and grabs her coat from the back of her chair.

"Hey boss. You headin' out?" She turns to see Esposito and Ryan staring her down with those damn shit-eating grins they sport when they know what she's up to.

She rolls her eyes at them and slips on her coat, flipping her hair out from the collar. "Can you guys cover for me? I just need to –"

"Go," Ryan says with a firm nod. "We'll call you if anything comes up."

Kate smiles at her partners and mouths "Thank you," before heading to the elevator.


	4. Chapter 4

**DISCLAIMER:** Unless I missed the memo, I do not own any of the Castle characters or pre-existing story lines.

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Keeping Watch: Part Four

The loft is quiet when she walks in and as she strips her jacket off and steps out of her shoes she wonders if he's gone back to bed.

She's surprised as she heads further towards is office to hear the clacking of his keyboard. He's writing. She debates whether she should even be here, considers leaving him to write and going back to the precinct. No. She needs to clear the air. Needs to put his mind at ease.

Kate stands in the doorway and sees the top of his head poking out from behind the back of his oversized desk chair. His feet are propped up on the cabinet behind the desk and she watches, mesmerized, as his fingers furiously tap out the words that are in his head. She leans against the doorjamb and watches for a few more seconds, if he knows she's here he hasn't made it obvious, but judging by the non-stop typing she's pretty sure he's oblivious. Until she finally speaks.

"They started after my mom died."

He doesn't startle when he hears her voice, simply stops typing. She watches him save the document he's working on and close the lid to his laptop, before turning around to face her, placing the computer back on the desk.

She takes this as a cue to enter the room, so she pushes herself off the doorframe and she sits on the couch, unable to gauge exactly where is head is right now and if he would appreciate being in close proximity to her.

"It was the same thing every time," she continues, "Her body in the alley, her voice calling for me from somewhere, asking for help. I would always wake up before I could get to her. If my dad ever took notice he never let on. But he was usually passed out before 9:00 anyway."

He watches her eyes intently as she speaks, sees the hurt. He knows how hard it is for her to talk about this. Thinks of how close she and her father are but briefly wonders how much anger she still holds over his years spent in the bottle.

"They were different when I joined homicide. Strange more than anything. Mostly about different cases we were working, especially the grisly ones." She pauses to steal a glance at him, surprised to see not anger, but compassion, empathy and _love _looking back at her. She chews her lip for a moment before continuing "They got worse after Montgomery's funeral." The hesitation in her voice doesn't go unnoticed and the fact that she refers to the day she almost died as, _Montgomery's funeral,_ leaves him feeling like a jerk. He knows this haunts her today, hell, it still haunts him. Never wanted her to have to rehash all the memories to explain herself to him.

"Kate, you don't –"

"No, it's okay. Let me finish." She says gently, shaking her head. "Look Castle, the point is, I've never had someone to wake me up from a nightmare. I didn't need someone to. At least I didn't think so" She shrugs before continuing. "My dad was too drunk, I wasn't dating anyone seriously enough to have them spend the night, and I holed up in my dad's cabin that summer, and…I don't know I got used to waking myself up, or riding it out until my alarm clock or my phone did it for me." She stops and looks up at him, "Until you. You woke me up from the nightmare. Even when I'm awake," she chuckles softly before continuing, "You bring this light to even the darkest situation we seem to find ourselves in."

"C'mere." He holds his arms out to her and she lifts herself off the couch and walks towards him, climbing into his lap, she rests her head on his shoulder.

"I still don't remember what the dream was about, but after you woke me up it didn't matter because even though I was still half asleep, I knew I didn't need to be afraid. I knew I was safe…I've never had that before." She sighs and lifts her head leaning back to look at his eyes. She places her hand on his cheek, running her thumb lightly over the dark circle under his eye. "Thank you for waking me up. Thank you for making me feel safe."

"Always."

A stunning smile breaks out over her face, one that matches his own, and she leans forward placing a tender kiss on his lips. When they part she nuzzles into his neck. They stay like that for a while until she finally says, "Come on. You should get some sleep."

Then he stands, scooping her into his arms and carries her to his bedroom laying her down on his bed, doesn't even bother closing the blinds to block out the afternoon sun, and climbs in beside her.

He falls asleep watching her.

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_Thanks for reading!_

_A/N: Yeah, yeah. I hate the "Always" I threw in there too, but it just seemed to flow better than "You're welcome" or "Anytime." Sorry._


End file.
